Bumbling from the edges, east of Broadway in Nashville, Tennessee, lays an eccentric and ever-growing rock n’ roll scene that has pushed out an assortment of eclectic noises that are far removed from the traditional ‘Nashville Sound’.
From the bright comic illustrated garage rock of JEFF The Brotherhood, to the fierce femininity of Bully, Nashville has been trying to redefine its music scene for nearly a decade. Ever since modern rock icons Jack White, The Black Keys and Kings of Leon moved into town there’s been a renaissance of sorts. Local artists are pushing the musical and sonic envelope like never before. But of these bands that have emerged, none of them sound quite like the microwave-pop that Savoy Motel creates.
Compromised of four longhaired (two females) twenty-somethings, the quartet look and sound like a spaced-out Wes Anderson 50’s pop art family band who were thrown into the 70s with all anomalous lessons of the 60s soaked in. Bassist/producer Jeffrey Novak and singer/drummer Jessica McFarland originally strived to create a project rooted in the legendary retro beats of the Maestro Rhythm King drum machine that was used famously throughout the 70s, most notably by funk artists such as Sly Stone.
The look isn’t purely aesthetic and the drum machine isn’t a gimmick; opener Souvenir Shop Rock starts with a lo-fi horn burst funk fake-out before settling into a chugging guitar rhythm that has shades of the Davies brothers. It’s funky, weird and frisky. The percussive and strutting Everyone Wants to Win sounds like and unearthed artifact from the late-60s. It marches with the confidence of a protest with its subtle samba-esque rhythmic loop, but it’s the swaying Motown inspired bass line that makes you want join the revolution.
Although the Maestro Rhythm King drum machine may have been the initial seed of the group, it certainly acts more as diligent a maestro compared to a dominating king, because the dynamic guitar duo of Mimi Galbierz and Dillon Watson certainty add several dimensions to the structure and feel of these songs with their distinctive, and often contrasting styles.
Along with joining McFarland on vocals, Galbierz’s funk-laden playing adds flavor to the beat pulsating Sorry People while her counterpart, Watson, enthusiastically shreds over a frizzled bouncy funk break. The inflating, gritty metallic groove of standout Doctor Cook is infectious, pushed by the harsh high-hats of the Rhythm King machine and a chugging blues-funk guitar riff, the group pile an assortment of hooks on top of this mechanic rhythmic foundation. Dank guitar leads, bizarre synth fizzles and a deliciously catchy doo-doo refrain, all hook and pop.
It’s Marc Bolan in 2016, only funkier and a bit more outré. The twitchy funk led singe Hot One is similarly jam-packed with hooks. The guitars are frenetic and the synths jitter with a bracing pace as swarms of oscillating hooks spontaneously crackle and fire off like a can of Coke paired with a pack of Mentos.
In addition to the songs being interesting excursions in genres, the closet lo-fi recording techniques used are absolutely marvelous. There’s a bunch of weird sounds on here that make these mismatched pop songs all that more captivating. The opening drum fill on Western Version Boogie booms like a kit made out of cardboard as an arcade jangle-funk synth line jumbles over a harmonized guitar solo like a never-ending bag of Nintendo popcorn.
Elsewhere, the bass funk on Mindless Blues sounds as loose and as stretched as a rubber band. The assortment of sounds is like finding and fitting pieces from fifty different puzzles to make something that ends up sounding like the audio equivalent of Picasso’s The Weeping Woman. These are pop songs at heart, but they are warped and rearranged in imaginative manner.
“It’s alright to be invited, everything will be provide, it’s alright to be excited,” Savoy Motel staff implore on the aforementioned highlight Sorry People, and they’re certainly right about that. Their world is extraordinarily their own. A mismatch of eras and influences ripped, pasted and transported into modern era. There’s a lot cooked up in these vivid treats of art-pop, but surprisingly these eight songs, and their copious amount of hooks and ideas, are tightly packed in a concise and comfortably digestible forty-minutes.
You’ll want to visit it again, and again.
